17
Aug
sony-xperia-p-to-receive-ics-update-between-august-19th-and-25th

Ice Cream Sandwich Rollout Begins For The Sony Xperia P, Coming "Shortly" For The Xperia Sola, Go, And U

Posted by in Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0, News, Sony, Xperia Go (Lotus), Xperia P (Nypon), Xperia sola (Pepper), Xperia U (Kumquat)

How often do you hear this? Sony has started to roll out Ice Cream Sandwich to the Xperia P ahead of schedule, beating its own date of August 19th.

According to a post on the Sony Mobile blog, the upgrade process is beginning today and continuing globally "over the next few weeks", so if you're an Xperia P owner, keep an eye out for any upgrade notifications on your phone. When ICS is ready for your device, you will be alerted, but Sony says that some users may have to use their PC Companion software to perform the update.

Some of the cool features and functionality you can look forward to include:

    • New ways to experience your media with new media applications – “WALKMAN”, “Album” and “Movies”
    • Extended standby mode, increasing standby time by up to four times (depending on user-profile and data consumption)
    • Lock screen with improved functionality
    • Resizable widgets for improved personalization
    • Improved control of your mobile data consumption
    • Recent Apps button for a clear overview of your applications

    The post also says that there will be another update for other Xperia phones "shortly", listing the Xperia U, Xperia sola and Xperia go.

    16
    Aug
    unnamed (3)

    Google Voice Search Now Available In Thirteen New Languages

    Posted by in Android OS, Applications, Google, News

    In a post to its official blog that's sure to excite users across the globe, Google has just announced that Voice Search is now available in thirteen new languages. The list of newly included languages, which range from Basque to Swedish, brings the total number of supported tongues up to 42.

    In the post, Product Manager Bertrand Damiba explains just what it takes to add a new language to Voice Search – first and foremost, Google must collect "hundreds of thousands of utterances" from volunteers to bring speech recognition up to par.

    While this sounds easy enough, Google engineers also face challenges in adding support for new languages – Damiba explains that languages that don't follow predictable pronunciation rules (like Swedish) require that Google recruit native speakers to pronounce thousands of individual words.

    16
    Aug
    gs3-jelly-bean-info

    [Update: Newer Firmware] Samsung Galaxy S III Jelly Bean Firmware Leaks With New Notification Bar And Google Now, Available To Download Now

    Posted by in Galaxy S III, Jelly Bean 4.1, Leaks, News

    We saw a video yesterday of a Samsung Galaxy S III running Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, with a revamped notification bar and access to Google Now. Fast forward 24 hours, and you can now get hold of that firmware yourself to try it out on your very own Galaxy S III.

    Update: A newer firmware I9300XXBLH4 got leaked over at XDA by Samsung-Updates.com. It's an OTA (meaning incremental update) that applies directly on top of I9300XXBLG8/I9300OXABLG8/I9300XXLH1.

    The folks at SamMobile have managed to get hold of the image, which is a slightly different build to the one shown in the video yesterday.

    15
    Aug
    play

    Google Play Movie Rentals Come To Germany, Hangouts On Air Spread Through Europe

    Posted by in Android OS, Google, News

    One of the most common complaints against Google's Play Store is the lack of certain content or functionality in countries outside the US. Google has been making progress in expanding access to other corners of the globe, though. You may remember, for example, that Play Books hit France just last month after Play Movies opened for the French in March and for Spain in June.

    Today, Google (finally) brought Play Movie rentals to Germany, much to the delight of German users who have been asking for more Play content for quite some time. Strangely, the addition of movie rentals to the German market came without an official announcement, but was confirmed by multiple Twitter users and our own readers.

    15
    Aug
    image

    Google Is Gearing Up To Finally Introduce Play Store Gift Cards And A Wishlist [APK Teardown]

    Posted by in Android OS, APK Teardown, Apps/Games, Google, News
    Last Updated: October 17th, 2012

    A new Google Play Store v3.8.15 apk started rolling out to Android devices today, but upon running through its UI, I was unable to uncover anything different from the versions before that. Yet the apk size gained a few pounds kilobytes, and not knowing what the 300KB of code and resources added was killing me. Not to worry, a few minutes later, I decoded both 3.7.15 and 3.8.15 and compared their contents.

    Play Store Gift Cards

    What I found inarguably points to Google gearing up to finally release redeemable Play Store gift cards - something we've been anxiously waiting for since the Android Market started supporting paid apps.

    15
    Aug
    4.1 better

    Leaked Samsung Galaxy S III Jelly Bean Build Pops Up On Video, Shows Off Revamped Notification Bar

    Posted by in Galaxy S III, Jelly Bean 4.1, Leaks, News

    In something of a surprise, it appears Samsung has already been hard at work on preparing the Android 4.1 Jelly Bean update for the Galaxy S III, as evidence by this YouTube video posted by AndroidMX. The build is labeled as i9300XADLG4. It's definitely looking legit, and while the visual changes to the Galaxy S III in Jelly Bean seem minor, there's no doubt that many owners of the device are absolutely chomping at the bit for access to Google Now in its full, un-ported glory. First, the video (warning: it's long and highly repetitive):

    Now, here are a few screencaps we managed to grab:

    4.1 better

    notibar introscreen

    noti2 home

    One thing you may notice is the revamped notification bar, which incorporates some of the new actions found in Jelly Bean like the instant sharing option for screenshots.

    14
    Aug
    adobe-flash-logo

    R.I.P. Flash For Android: A Eulogy To The Plugin That We All Wanted To Love, But Never Really Could

    Posted by in Android OS, Apps/Games, Development, News

    I remember the first time I really heard about Flash for Android. Well, maybe not heard about it. The first time I got sort of excited about it. It was in San Francisco, at a trendy Spanish-restaurant-meets-brewery back in the summer of 2010. The taps were pouring freely (and by that, I mean free of charge), tasty little hors d'oeuvres came at us from from all directions, and everyone was having a good, if typically nerdy-awkward, time. The free booze definitely helped. It was also, coincidentally, the first time I met the man in charge of Android Police, Artem, and one of our long-standing editors, Aaron Gingrich.

    13
    Aug
    Jelly-Bean-Logo_thumb1_thumb

    Getting To Know Android 4.1, Part 4: Miscellaneous Stuff, The New Default App Picker, And Insight From A Googler!

    Posted by in Features, Getting To Know Android, Jelly Bean 4.1, News
    Last Updated: October 14th, 2012

    GTKA is back! For those that don't know, this is the series where we compare the new version of Android to the previous one, in excruciating detail. I'm going to dub this the "Miscellaneous edition," because there is a bunch of new things I want to talk about, but they don't really fit into a nice, organized category. (This doesn't mean I'm running out of things to talk about, not by a long shot.) The usual GTKA style applies, Ice Cream Sandwich is on the left, Jelly Bean is on the right. Let's get to it:

    wm_2012-06-27-20.40.36_thumbwm_2012-07-01-14.13.11_thumb

    Has anyone else noticed a general toning down of the Tron design from Honeycomb to ICS to Jelly Bean?

    13
    Aug
    image

    Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 Wi-Fi (GT-P7510) Ice Cream Sandwich Update Rolling Out In The U.S.

    Posted by in Galaxy Tab 10.1, Ice Cream Sandwich 4.0, News, Samsung

    Two weeks after ICS first hit the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Europe and mere days after the kernel source release, the delicious 254MB update has now reached the States. The Android version is 4.0.4, and the Samsung version is IMM76D.UELPL (also P7510UELPL depending on where you look). Go ahead and check for it manually if you don't see a notification just yet or fire up Kies.

    gtabupdate

    Congratulations to all the Wi-Fi Tab 10.1 owners. Welcome to the club.

    Thanks, Brett and @djgraff209!

    More: XDA, SamMobile

    10
    Aug
    image

    Documents Reveal That Apple Asked Samsung For Up To $30 Per Phone And $40 Per Tablet For Patent Licenses

    Posted by in Android OS, Legal, News, Samsung

    As most of our readers are surely aware, the Apple vs Samsung case is still boiling, and over the course of nearly two weeks since the trial's beginning, document after document has revealed juicy details from both sides regarding previously unreleased designs, plans, and even sales figures. While so far we've avoided piecemeal coverage of the case's twists and turns, a new development (reported earlier this evening by The Verge) reveals something particularly interesting.

    applesamsungslide01

    We've known for some time that Apple attempted to sell Samsung on patent licensing back in 2010, but according to a document released today (and the testimony of Apple Exec Boris Teksler), Apple had proposed specific dollar figures per license – up to $30 per Phone and $40 per tablet, to which (according to Apple's slide deck) "Samsung should respond favorably." According to the proposal, Samsung would be responsible for a base rate of $30 per touchscreen phone (including phones running Android, Windows, Symbian, and Bada) and $40 per tablet (which would decrease to just $30 over two years).

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